Stranded Book Log Part 6The Other Stuff In The Beartoothsby Dan Hartman

July 26, 2013

Day 16

I'm working on vegetation this week. The baby pika are no longer cute and its' still early to photograph grass gathering, so I'll give the little fellas a break from me.

I arrived at West Summit just after dawn and who was there to great me. My mountain fox! The first time we've crossed paths since my camera fiasco. He just sat there in the flowers looking at me, before climbing up through the rocks to disappear.

By the way, I've had to send my camera off for repair.

I spent the rest of the morning working on alpine flowers, then drove to East Summit. It's alarming when one sees how quickly the trees are dying there.

Last fall I photographed clarks nutcrackers and pine squirrels harvesing white bark pine nuts. Those same cone bearing trees are now dead or dying with no end in sight.

Day 17

I explored some side canyons looking for unusual flowers and anything else I might stumble upon. And I did find something unusual only it wasn't what I expected. Behind a big boulder in the middle of nowhere lay a bed spring! Now I really can't think of a better place to take a nap, but who would carry this heavy thing way out here?

Day 18

I drove up Dunraven to work the wildflowers. Along the way I spotted two wolves, (a black and a gray) hunting east of Trout Lake. While on the Pass I checked out the white bark pines. There were cones, but it's not going to be a good year. I saw maybe a dozen or two in some trees. Far from the hundreds we had per tree in the Beartooths last fall.

Day 19

I'm looking for bumblebees today. Certain species are disappearing and since they have varying tongue lengths, some flowers require these bees for pollination.

Kelly was with me and soon spotted one on a flower. I couldn't get on it in time, then it was gone. Two hours went by and we still hadn't seen another. I decided to make a move. We found a patch of larger flowers and waited. Finally one appeared then another. It took a while but I got the shot.